By Mark Kleis

Monday, Mar 7th, 2011 @ 7:18 am

While legislators in the U.S. may have recently sent a message to reject the move from 10 to 15 percent ethanol in the nation's gasoline, in Germany the motorists have strongly rejected even the 10 percent ethanol recently pushed by the European Union.

The rejection by consumers comes after roughly half of the 15,000 gas stations in Germany began offering E10 fuel, according to AutoHaus, but before the rest of the nation's stations could be converted, the Federal Minister has ordered a halt so that an emergency summit can be held in order to find a solution to the rejection of the new fuel.

What has essentially happened is that drivers have chosen to almost entirely avoid buying the E10 fuel, which is Super grade of 95 octane but contains 10 percent ethanol, and are instead opting for the Super Plus, which is 98 octane but has no ethanol. The result is that gas stations are stuck with old supplies of E10 fuel that consumers refuse to purchase.

Contrasted to the U.S. and select states, such as California, drivers are not given a choice of traditional fuel or an ethanol blend. Instead, the states have mandated the use of E10 across all fuel grades, and force consumers to purchase the often heavily subsidized ethanol blend, which is also known to return lower fuel economy. The upside to ethanol blends according to advocates is the reduction of tailpipe emissions.

Those who argue against E10, such as the consumers in Germany and even environmentalists such as Greenpeace, say that the net environmental impact of ethanol-blended fuels is worse for the environment than traditional fuels. The Truth About Cars points out that the environmental protection group Greenpeace has even stated that, "E10 can ruin cars and the environment."